coils
by bellmare
Summary: the problem was that nobody knew where the point of no return lay. —Stein/Medusa.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Eater, or any of the characters depicted in this work of fiction.**

**- - x x x x x - -**

The first thing he is aware of is the cold.

It rushes over his skin in waves of chilled zephyrs, attacking his hands and nipping at the exposed skin not protected by his voluminous lab-coat. He now finds himself in this realm of uncertainty and emptiness, unsure as to how he even landed here to begin with.

In this grey-washed, twilit landscape, he has never felt more alone.

Images flicker through his mind, accompanied by a rush of blinding static; the features of those in his minds' eye are indistinct and blurred, and he can no longer make out who is who.

He resigns himself to wandering aimlessly through the bleak wasteland, searching fruitlessly for a way out, knowing, all the while, that liberation would never be his to grasp in this frigid abyss. As far as he can tell, he is the sole existing entity in this nebulous no-man's-land, accompanied only by the mocking presence of his paranoia, which taunt him as he struggles deeper and deeper towards the distant monochromatic horizon.

Then, all of a sudden, a voice cuts through his fugue; it is the high voice of a child, the last thing Stein expected to hear here, of all places.

What could such an innocent being possibly be doing in this wretched emptiness?

Slowly, tremulously, he turns, to face the source of the voice; his disbelieving eyes settle upon the petite figure standing but mere feet away from him, regarding him with calm, expressionless curiosity. She appears completely and utterly at ease in this unnaturally dead realm, despite the frigid cold that plays at the ends of her honey-gold hair, at the simple, unpretentious clothes she wears.

More to reassure himself than anything else, he clears his throat, rasping a question to the stoic child. "Are you lost, little girl?" His voice sounds strained to his own ears, and he prays she cannot detect the faint edge of panic rising within his words.

She shakes her head slightly, shoulder-length blonde hair trembling with the motion. "No," she assures him calmly, crystal-clear voice seeming to dissipate the fog he sees lingering over the surface of the greyish, mysteriously nonexistent water they are immersed, ankle-deep, within. As he regards her, baffled, the girl cocks her head to the side, gazing at him with glinting amber eyes. "But I'm searching for something I left behind. What about you, mister?"

Though a response rises to his tongue, he finds himself unable to answer; mutely, he shakes his head at the girl, who smiles slightly at his confusion. "I see." Silence rushes in to fill the space left behind by her words as they vanish into the air, the hush broken only by the sound of a single droplet of water hitting the still surface of the endless lake they stand upon. He glances down to track the progress of the ripples, watching as they spread outwards to hit his shoes.

"I can help you," the girl utters suddenly, raising her head to look him squarely in the eye; despite all his delusions, despite the voices murmuring within the cocoon of his skull, he feels his unease melt away. "I can help you to escape from this world."

"Can you…really?" he echoes warily, surveying her through the filmy lenses of his cracked spectacles; she nods, a smile spreading across her features. Before his eyes, she raises a small, delicate hand, proffering it with a gentleness that unnerves him.

He surveys the diminutive hand outstretched towards him, loose fingers curled slightly as though beckoning him to take it. He transfers his gaze back to the impassive façade of the girl, moistening his lips as he speaks. "How did you get here? And how will you get us both out?"

The girl laughs; it is a mellifluous, tinkling sound which serves as a balm to his tortured ears, banishing the buzz of static which fills his fevered brain. "I have many ways to get about."

The temptation to grasp the girl's hand and submit himself to her guidance is almost too great; at the base of his cranium, new voices awaken, their whispers imploring him to remember himself. He ignores them. Gingerly, hesitantly, he takes a measured step forwards, staggering slightly as he nears the smiling child.

She neither skitters back at his sudden surge of movement, nor does she vanish into thin air like he believed she would; the golden-eyed girl was still standing before him, closer now, a look of warm compassion in the depths of her gaze.

She will not judge him.

There is something oddly familiar about her, though, something hauntingly recognisable about her, though he does not recall having ever seen this girl before. That voice, those eyes…there is an enigmatically hypnotic feel to them, and he finds his fears gradually fading away, merely by being in her presence. A memory stirs within his mind, and an image of a woman – he cannot quite remember her face – swims before his delirious eyes.

Before he can take her hand, though, the voices in his head give way to a screaming crescendo; a shrill, urgent whine begins at the back of his skull, and his every instinct screams at him to stop; a new voice cuts through his thoughts: the voice of a boy. He opens his eyes to discover he is crouched before the girl, on his knees and clutching his aching cranium; raising his head slightly, Stein finds himself gazing at a pale boy with greenish-hazel eyes and ghostly silver-grey hair, clad in heavily-stitched clothing. Despite his addled thoughts, a surprisingly lucid revelation comes to him.

That boy is himself.

He gapes blankly at his youthful self, who shouts back at him with a warning in his voice. _"Don't go with her! She's a witch!"_

Unsettled and alarmed, he turns back to face the girl, to find she is gone; his gaze roves upwards, to be faced with the familiar features of a woman he had imagined was dead and gone, slain by his hands. She is everything he remembered, and more – with that supple, sinuous figure he had vaguely allowed himself to admire, with the same, insouciantly feline half-smile on her lips, with the same sleek dark blonde hair and the tantalising glint in her eyes.

"Medusa," he whispers; the witch neither affirms nor dispels his revelation of her identity. For a split second, he tears his eyes away from hers, frenzied stare searching desperately for the slight-framed boy. He is gone, and once more, silence descends, heavy and leaden, over the area.

He struggles to get to his feet, but is stopped by a slender hand, resting gently upon his shoulder, pressing down with faintly oppressive force. A rustle of movement, and they are now face to face, the witch kneeling before him, fingers wandering upwards; she cups his face in her hand, draping her other arm over his shoulder, to snake behind his back. "I always knew you would find your way to me," she intones softly, her voice a silken purr.

The urgent chorus has died away, though panic and repulsion streams through his system like adrenaline; despite that, though, he finds himself rendered immobile, rooted in place, eyes boring into those of the woman who would be his downfall. "Y-you—" he begins, but is unable to continue.

Her arms encircle his neck, and she pulls him into an embrace, speaking softly into his ear. "I have waited so long for you to come here," she breathes, a hint of the child creeping back into her tone, "and now that you're finally with me, everything is right again."

He finds himself unable to speak, locked as he is in place by the mere presence of the woman. Her finger traces invisible circles upon his shoulder blade, as she continues to speak in that tauntingly honeyed tone, testing his willpower. "You remember that offer I made you? During our battle in the very bowels of Shibusen…when I asked if you wanted to join me, in a world we would re-create? Tell me. Is your answer the same now as it was then?" He feels her nails lingering near his neck, and wonders what she will do; a part of him yearns for her to rip his very life away, to end this charade, but another part of him wishes for her to continue, to entice his darker thoughts with her noxiously sweet nothings. "We may have our differences," she continues calmly, "but at the end, we are both scientists, willing to test everything we see, for the sake of gleaning answers. Am I not correct? So, I say this now: come and join me, working along me…side by side…as a colleague, and, perhaps, something more…" Her voice drops to a suggestive whisper; he can no longer shut her out.

There is something so intensely _wrong_ about this shared physical proximity of theirs; he is disgusted by this, for allowing himself to be comforted by the presence of this treacherous snake. A ripple in the water beneath the soles of his shoes distracts him from his train of thought, and he glances down, shocked by what he sees. Reflected in the dull, unmoving fluid, he sees himself, glasses askew and eyes wide and bloodshot; his features hang slack, a lank mop of pallid hair standing at half-hearted, unruly attention upon his scalp. This is the face of a person he can barely recognise, and, as he transfers his stare to the figure accompanying his reflection, surprise surges through his veins, suffusing him with a momentary burst of strength, and momentarily overriding his lethargy.

He sees not the image of his tormentor, but, rather, the guileless form of a child, her bare, frail arms wrapped around his neck; she seems to sense his scrutiny, and her closed lids slide apart to reveal vibrant tawny eyes, with black slits for pupils. A smile curves across her lips, slashing her face into two, and in his addled mind, he finally makes the connection. Medusa and this innocent child are one and the same.

The witch pulls away from their embrace, and the warmth of her body is gone; now, she is the child again, staring down at his prone form, with the hand still stretched out before her.

Daring him to take it.

He looks back up at her, in an attempt to read her expression; there is nothing but kindness on her cherubic face, as the petite female offers to lead him to salvation.

"Is there really somewhere out there you can take me to?" he questions with a calm he does not quite feel; again, she does not answer, still seeking to close the distance between them with her simple gesture. He steels himself, making up his mind, and gives himself up to her.

For an instant, as his rough, calloused palm closes around the fine-boned, smooth-skinned hand of the girl, he wonders what he is doing; as suddenly as the thoughts came, though, he shuts them off, rising unsteadily to his feet, and marvelling at the sensation of the solidity of the little girl beside him.

"Come with me, mister," she chirps. Slowly, yet firmly, she tugs at his arm, leading him towards a twisted tree, whose arrowlike boughs point towards the eerily white sky, as though piercing the heavens themselves. As they venture deeper into the fog, he glances down again at his reflection, unable to stop himself.

He sees a haggard and bedraggled man, shambling through the gloom; there is no child alongside him, and he is completely and utterly alone, save for the lithe form of a black-scaled snake, its hide patterned with arrows; the serpent is entwined around his shoulders, with its angular head nestled close to his throat, forked tongue flickering out to brush against the line of his jaw.

There is no turning back now.

**- - x x x x x - -**

**BACKCHAT**_**!**_**: IS R.V. REALLY WRITING A ONE-SHOT? AND A SERIOUS-ISH STORY, TO BOOT? OH HELL YEAH.**

**No, wait, I amend that: IS R.V. REALLY WRITING A ONE-SHOT THAT DIDN'T SPONTANEOUSLY MUTATE INTO A MULTI-CHAPTERED FIC. Oh no ya did-ent!**

**Mmyeah. Based on episode 41 of the anime when Stein goes bonkers, and littlegirl!Medusa leads him astray, hohoho. Hey, don't judge me, Medusa/Stein is hot, mmkay? Two psychos pretty much using one another. Talk about enemies with benefi—okay, y'know what? I'll stop now.**

**Reviews always appreciated~! (:**


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